pain demands to be felt
by eponnia
Summary: Post DH/pre-epilogue. Every year without fail since he left Hogwarts, Harry remembers his parents' sacrifice on the night they died while others go out to celebrate All Hallows' Eve. [Hinny one-shot inspired by a submission to harrypotterconfessions on tumblr]


**AUTHOR'S NOTE: As of 2013, it has been thirty-two years since James and Lily died. **

**This is my first published HP fic, inspired by a submission on October 10, 2013, to harrypotterconfessions on tumblr (I have written a Hogwarts AU for another fandom, _Les Misérables_, but it was only a HP-inspired/crossover-type fic) Here's the exact quote from the confession - "_I've always found it so odd that Harry treats Halloween like its a normal day, or even something to look forward to, and not the anniversary of his parents death_." **

**I never really thought about that before, so I decided to write this. I understand that when Harry was young he didn't understand the significance of the date, but when he got older I'd like to think he set aside the day to remember Lily and James' sacrifice. As stated in the summary, this is set after DH but post-Battle of Hogwarts. Harry and Ginny are now married by this point, and James Sirius has been born.**

**This story also includes my headcanon that Harry and Ginny moved to Godric's Hollow to his parents' cottage after they got married. The rest of my headcanon goes like this - they lived in Grimmauld Place for a while, but as it is definitely not a family friendly place to raise children, they moved to Godric's Hollow and fixed up his parents' cottage. That house was where she learned she was pregnant for the first time, and where they raised all their children. I don't believe they ever left - Harry would want to stay close to his parents' memories, and Ginny would respect that. **

**The title of this fic is an alteration of a quote from John Green's exquisitely written and heartbreakingly beautiful novel, _The Fault in Our Stars_.**

* * *

"That's the thing about pain," Augustus said, and then glanced back at me. "It demands to be felt."

― John Green, _The Fault in Our Stars_

* * *

The doorbell rang, but Harry didn't move to answer it.

He sat in the living room, seated on the floor with his back against an armchair, long legs stretched out across the rug as he gazed into the fire. The doorbell rang again, but he still did not acknowledge the sound. Harry knew he was being rude, but tonight he didn't care in the least.

"Harry?"

He looked up to see Ginny standing in the doorway of the living room, their two-month-old son at her hip. "Are you alright?" his wife asked.

He shrugged and said nothing, returning his gaze to the fire.

He saw her take a step forward out of the corner of his eye, but the doorbell rang again. With a sigh, she went to the door; when it opened, he heard a chorus of childish voices proclaim, "Trick or treat!"

He heard Ginny praising the Muggle children's' costumes, handing out candy and thanking the children's' mothers' for their compliments directed to the two-month-old James that she still carried. As she called out goodbyes to the families as they left, Harry briefly thought of the conversation he had had with his wife a few years before, explaining the Muggle Halloween. Ginny had thought it was merely a celebration of the wizarding world surviving another year, as was tradition on the thirty-first of October in the magical community to acknowledge a New Years' for their kind. Most wizards did celebrate the Muggle New Year, as it marked the end of the calendar year that they had adopted, but the last day of October had been the holiday for magical folk for centuries.

The front door shut, and Harry heard Ginny leave the small foyer and enter the living room. Holding James in her arms, she sat on the floor beside her husband in silence. Harry took out his wand and twirled it in his right hand absentmindedly as Ginny moved James to her lap, placing the infant so he lay nestled in her crisscross folded legs.

"Did you know it's been twenty-three years since they died?" he said, his grip tightening on his wand. Ginny looked up at him, brown eyes serious and red hair catching the firelight as he continued. "Voldemort just walked in and killed them, here, in this house."

"Harry," Ginny said, "let go of your wand." When he gave her a confused look, she explained, "You'll break it if you keep holding it like that."

He looked down to notice his death grip on his wand for the first time, and loosened his hold, watching as color seeped back into his nearly-white knuckles. Ginny's left hand gently covered his right, her fingers curling around his hand, and gently pulled his wand out of his hand. Setting the wand on the rug between them, she weaved her fingers between his. James chose that moment to make a gurgling sound, and the husband and wife's attention moved to their two-month-old. Ginny leaned to rest her head on Harry's shoulder.

"I came to this cottage before we moved in," he said. "It was before the battle, when we were looking for the horcruxes. Ron had left at that point, so it was just Hermione and me. We came to find the sword of Gryffindor and ended up getting attacked by Voldemort's snake, but we stopped by this place before all that happened. We saw my parents' graves, too."

Harry tightened his grip on Ginny's hand subconsciously. "I don't remember if I ever told you this, but I saw my parents' murders in Voldemort's mind, and what happened after in Snape's memories." He pointed to the stairs with his left hand. "He killed my father on the stairs, on the landing. But my mum died in the nursery, the same room we're using for James, which was mine when they lived here. She stood between him and me. He gave her a choice to stand aside, but she didn't. And she died for it."

His green eyes were starting to sting. The twenty-four-year-old wizard took off his glasses, resting them on his thigh, and pressed the heel of his left hand into each of his eyes. Lowering his hand, Harry stared into the fire, not caring that the light caused his eyes to hurt more and water more in tandem with his welling tears.

Gently pulling her hand from his ever-tightening grip, Ginny moved James from her lap, carefully laying the infant on his back on the rug. Folding her legs underneath her, she reached up to pull her husband into an embrace. The witch did not say anything, and Harry was grateful she knew he would not appreciate words of advice or comfort. Instead, she let him rest his chin on her shoulder, rubbing soothing circles into his back as he drew in a shuddering breath.

"Can I ask you something?" Ginny said, and he pulled away from her to nod in response, putting his glasses back on before looking at her. "Why did you want to move to this house, as your parents died here? Why are we raising our son in the very room your mother died?"

He shrugged. "A symbol of new life? To honor their memories? I don't know. It just felt... right, I guess."

As James began to fuss, Ginny reached for their son, but Harry beat her to it. He felt her gaze rest on him as he lay their son on his own lap, letting James try to wrap a small hand around one Harry's fingers. He gazed at the two-month-old for a moment, and when James met his father's gaze, Harry spoke.

"Always remember that we love you," he said to his son, his voice starting to thicken slightly. He cleared his throat before continuing. "You'll probably get sick of hearing it growing up and will want us to stop when you're a teenager, but I won't ever stop telling you. You are loved, James, and you'll never be alone. As long as your mother and I are still here, nothing will ever hurt you, I promise."

"You can't shield him from everything," Ginny countered gently.

Harry looked up at her. "I know. There will be lessons he will need to learn on his own. But I don't want him to be alone without anyone to turn to."

Ginny leaned to rest her head on Harry's shoulder again. "I think I said this before, but you are and will be the best father our son could ever ask for."

"I want him to have what I didn't," Harry replied.

The grandfather clock struck midnight.


End file.
